


Broad Strokes

by FourSeasons



Series: Oneshots 2020-2021 [2]
Category: The Half of It (2020)
Genre: Angst, Friendship, Frienship/love, Male-Female Friendship, Moving On, Other, Short One Shot, Soul-Searching, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-03
Updated: 2020-05-03
Packaged: 2021-03-01 16:42:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23980273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FourSeasons/pseuds/FourSeasons
Summary: The very small ways Paul looked at life after his confession to Ellie
Relationships: Ellie Chu & Paul Munsky
Series: Oneshots 2020-2021 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982503
Comments: 4
Kudos: 67





	Broad Strokes

It had been scary to think of life in terms of broad strokes. Ellie had moved away and Paul really didn’t know what to do with that. Ellie had been a friend, but more than that she had been the first love. Love in the big romantic sense of the word.

Love meant the broad kind, something that was supposed to be lived out. Ellie was bigger and smarter than Squahamish and the life the small town had to offer her. She talked in big ideas, which she made small enough for him to understand. He understood that she loved Aster with the big broad strokes of a brush on paper or the quietest strum of the guitar.

When Paul wasn’t thinking of actively avoiding the thought of the rejection, he wondered if he could move on from this. He loved her. It was just that simple.

He loved the quiet life Ellie and Mr. Chu led. How their interactions stood so quietly in contrast to his own with his own family. He loved how the spices in their cabinet were wildly different from his own. Paul was confronted with the notion that maybe he loved the idea of Ellie more than he loved Ellie, the same way he had Aster.

Really, after the confession at the end of the game, he wondered if they could go back to normal. Church had proved otherwise. There were never going to go back to how things were “before”. A confession of true love and then a realization that the feelings were not reciprocated. It was not an ending, but rather a redirection. Paul could do that; he could love Ellie from afar.

There was a saying that goes “you never really get over your first love”. Paul did get over Aster, so he naively thought the process of getting over Ellie would be the same. Around Ellie love was still the same: old films, new books (at least to Paul they were new), Yakult and Mr. Chu.

So as the train pulled away from Squahamish, carrying the person who made his world broader than it had been, Paul had no choice but to run with it. Paul did, he ran to catch up with the lost feelings and then ran to let them go. He saw those tears, although she didn’t want him to see them.

She was meant for things bigger than this. To love was to let go and move on.

Paul moved on, he made more recipes and checked up on Mr. Chu. Mr. Chu didn’t mind the weird combinations of meat and sauce as much as his own family did. He called Ellie every week, sometimes with Aster and at other times alone. She didn’t always reply to the texts, but he had a feeling university was like that. Ellie was in a place where her big ideas would be seen as the norm and maybe she wouldn’t be a complete outlier because of it.

The next time he saw her, his heart did not hurt painfully. The pain was still there, it may always be there. However, Paul's world became braver after Ellie. Although she may never realize it. Paul did it and because of her made his first bold stroke in a canvas that should have been plain and beige.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think I've adored a movie more.


End file.
